Read More - Vote for Investments in Child Health: change.org
The Leading Child Killers No One Is Talking About

Which two diseases kill the most children worldwide? If you guessed AIDS, malaria, or measles, you're wrong. Pneumonia and diarrhea claim the lives of more children under age 5 than those three diseases combined and account for over 30% of child deaths worldwide.

Pneumonia and diarrhea kill more children than any other disease - yet most people are unaware that this common illness has such a profound impact on the world's children. Every day, 10,000 children die from pneumonia and diarrhea despite the fact that affordable prevention and treatment options exist. For millions of children around the world, these diseases could be prevented with vaccines and medicines that cost less than $10.
Read More - BGA Donates $1800 to Haiti Disaster Relief Fund
Battleground Academy's Middle School, Grades 5-8, collected over $1,800 from their students as a fundraiser for Haiti Relief efforts. The students gave a minimum donation of $5 for the privilege of wearing blue jeans to school (in exchange for their typical uniform attire).
Read More - Water Purifier, Sterilizer, and Air Transport: Your Investment, Their Health
As of this week, we've been able to donate over $115,000 of your generous gifts to provide immediate assistance for the victims of the earthquake in Haiti. Most recently, beneficiaries have included Missionary Flights International, which has provided air transport during this time of crisis in Haiti, and Mobile Medical Disaster Relief, which will be purchasing tetanus, diphtheria, and pertussis vaccinations for over 6500 children in Port au Prince.
Read More - Big Kenny Releases new song about Haiti Crisis: Cry with You
On January 3rd, Big Kenny was awoken with a strong emotion. Thirty minutes later it was the words to "Cry With You." Big Kenny worked on "Cry With You" while planning his departure to Haiti to help search for Walt who was in the country working on several renewable energy projects at the time. It features a broad range of spirit and talent who came into The Last Dollar Studio to track and complete the song while Big Kenny was away. The song includes the First String Orchestra directed by Carl Marsh, recorded at Oceanway Studios the day prior to Big Kenny's departure to Haiti, spoken word by Senator Bill Frist just back from Haiti himself, Better Than Ezra members Kevin Griffin and Travis McNabb, Glotown Artist Damien Horne, Lo Carter as well as many others.
Read More - Stories from the Field -- From Haiti
February 10, 2010

Three Updates: Reflections and Reports

We continue to receive reports from friends and acquaintances and partners who are still in the field in Haiti. We want to share three of those stories today.
Read More - Responding to Need: Synthes -- Medical Supplies and Equipment
The work in Haiti continues, and there are still so many suffering. It is difficult to see if help is actually getting through at times with so much devastation and need. If you've followed my blog and twitter feed, you read some of the amazing things that have happened down there during this short time. There are hundreds of stories like these, but I wanted to share one with you now and thank the efforts of so many to make at least one success story.

I traveled to Haiti with Samaritan's Purse, an international relief organization, who had their first physician on the ground on January 13. Their work was tremendous and immediate. While I was there, they had built up to a 55-person Disaster Assistance Relief Team (DART), of which 21 were medical professionals. That number has only continued to grow since.
Read More - Big Kenny in Haiti, In Search of Missing Friend
**Hope Through Healing Hands donated $5,000 to Big Kenny's Love Everybody, LLC to support the medical and trauma services he and his team provided in Haiti.

by Cindy Watts

The Tennessean Blog

Country singer "Big Kenny" Alphin was in the Charlotte, N.C., airport flying home to Nashville from a gig when he saw the news - a 7.0 magnitude earthquake had struck Haiti. Capital city Port au Prince was in shambles. More than 100,000 people were presumed dead.

Alphin immediately called Jeanne Ratterman. Her husband, Alphin's friend Walt Ratterman, had been in Port au Prince since Jan. 2.

The news - no news.
Read More - Save the Children: Invisible Lives airing on BBC World

January 25, 2010

Invisible Lives, a documentary scheduled to air worldwide January 26 at 20:30 GMT on BBC World, will be featuring the work of Save the Children.  In the documentary, Dr. Joy Lawn, a newborn health expert with Save the Children, travels to Nepal and Malawi to examine how these two countries, although worlds apart, are making progress in saving newborn lives. The documentary explores how these low-income countries are among the few on track to meet the United Nation's Millennium Development Goal of reducing deaths of children under 5 years of age by 2/3 by 2015 despite a myriad of obstacles.

Those who have satellite television or special cable may have access to the program on the BBC World Channel.  If you don't, there will be a free download to the video of the program on and after 26th January at www.rockhopper.tv

 

Read More - Physicians helping physicians: A Story of Hope in Haiti
Just after our arrival at the Port au Prince airport, I met a volunteer medical team on the tarmac. They had supplies, but they were stranded at the airport with nowhere to go. They were awaiting UN directions and approval to leave.

We had just gotten off our plane and they saw my Samaritan's Purse hat and asked for help. We only had one truck so I told them I'd just received an email from King's hospital and that they were in dire need of help.

I said I would postpone our departure from the airport to have our truck take them immediately to King's hospital if they were willing. They were dropped off...
Read More - 1.20.10 USAID-DCHA Latest Update

January 21, 2010

This is the latest update sent by USAID-DCHA to be released to the public.

KEY DEVELOPMENTS

At 0603 hours local time, a magnitude 5.9 aftershock occurred 35 miles southwest of Port-au-Prince, with the epicenter located near Petit Goâve town, Ouest Department, according to the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS). According to the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), an estimated 94,000 people experienced very strong shaking during the aftershock; however, the extent of the damages and injures currently remain unclear. According to the USAID Disaster Assistance Response Team (USAID/DART), U.S. urban search and rescue (USAR) teams are deploying to aftershock-affected areas, including Petit Goâve and Léogâne towns, to assess potential damages.

Following the aftershock, U.S. USAR teams began resurveying buildings to identify potential new open spaces created by the aftershock where survivors may be trapped and monitor building shifts.

On January 20, USAID's Office of Food for Peace (USAID/FFP) contributed an additional $20 million to the U.N. World Food Program (WFP) Emergency Operation for Haiti, increasing USAID/FFP's overall contribution to $68 million to date. At present, expedited commodity purchases are being organized.

1.20.10 USAID-DCHA Haiti-Earthquake Fact Sheet #8

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